In an interview with @CaitMcGlade, Susan Severe said that on any given day, she was one of five people left to care for ~65 residents across 3 units at Austin House. Sometimes she’d radio her coworkers for help — and get nothing but static. 🧵(1/8) azcentral.com/in-depth/news/…
In January 2021, a resident attacked Susan. By the time her coworkers got to her, she’d already been seriously injured. She left her last shift at Austin House on a stretcher, blinded in one eye, having wet herself from terror.
During our investigation, we found ~30 police reports documenting when residents physically took their frustrations out on caregivers. You can read summaries of these incidents via the randomizer tool embedded throughout our stories (shoutout to the awesome dev team @USATODAY!).
Susan didn’t feel protected or supported by her employer, and she isn’t alone. In several of the state reports @MelinaWalling, @CaitMcGlade and I read, caregivers cited short staffing as a frustration and a reason for overlooked or poorly handled tasks.